


The Army Field Guide To...

by Huggeroftrees



Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: Army, F/F, First Time, Friendship, Humor, Romance, Smut, War Era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-07
Updated: 2012-01-07
Packaged: 2017-10-29 02:58:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 26
Words: 3,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/315074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Huggeroftrees/pseuds/Huggeroftrees
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Amongst the Officers of the Very Distinguished Borogravian Army a battered volume can be found stuffed ready to hand in the top of packs, or folded into greatcoat pockets. It has proved invaluable in any number of scenarios, providing advice and occasionally life-saving manoeuvres when faced with an enemy of intelligence. This is not that slightly foxed tome. This is something completely different.<br/>A collection of drabbles related to the lighter and more fumble-y side of army life. Femslash warning: Polly/Mal containing an explosion of humorous innuendo with associated non-explicit adult themes .</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. A

**Author's Note:**

> When originally posted, the following Author Note was included:
> 
> There will be 26 of these eventually. They will be published in individual chapters, partly to ensure they don't run into each other with an overload of drabbling, partly because they don't occur in any kind of chorological order but instead jump around all over the place. But in truth it's mainly due to the fact U, X and some other annoying letters are really hard to complete and I'll be a Monkey's Uncle before I wait around for the final inspiration. I apologise if this overloads anyone's alert system.
> 
>  **Disclaimer:** Terry Pratchett owns the characters and the world they live on. Author is grateful for all the brilliant books and makes no claim of ownership in any way.

## The Army Field Guide to Abominations, Assessment of: (100 words.)

 _"Enchanting..."_

"Hmm?" Lazy lashes fluttered up.

"I forget sometimes," Mal paused, a delicate fingertip tracing the curve of a collarbone. "In all the hurly burly and light hearted banter I somehow forget just how beautiful you are…"

She hovered over the medallion, nestling in the hollow of a throat.

"...And then you smile and it takes my breath away, every time."

"Mal?" She couldn't be drunk surely, they'd not left the room for the last three hours and all she'd imbibed before that were the usual four espressos.

Clear eyes met Polly's in the late afternoon sunlight.

"Perfect... _simply perfect_."


	2. B

## The Army Field Guide to Bribery: (100 words.)

 _"C'mon Polly..."_

A shake of the head.

"They have coffee liqueurs." The pleading look tried valiantly to soften that hard heart. "57 varieties, Polly. Even Fouquet's only has five."

"It's a vampire bar." Polly was adamant. "I'll get eaten. I feel no desire to get eaten today."

"I promise you Pol, on my honour as a dastardly untruthful army brat, there will be no eating tonight that you will not find measurably pleasant."

There was a pause as her companion worked out all the possibilities contained in that cleverly worded statement and then blushing, Polly relented.

 _"But only a few..."_


	3. C

## The Army Field Guide to Clandestine Operations: (100 words.)

 _"Mal?"_

 _"Shhh!"_

Expressive eyes above the hand clamped over her mouth screamed that Polly was willing to keep silent if, _please gods_ , Mal would only return to the task in hand.

Two figures frozen in the shadows, rusty metal of the storage container cold against Polly's back, Mal straining to locate the sound that had interrupted the quiet of the isolated dock.

 _"New heartbeat."_ Her whisper caressing Polly's neck. _"Think it's our guy."_

A rueful smile and she was gone, leaving Polly slumped trembling against the wall. Gathering herself together, Polly cursed surveillance ops, drew her sword and gave chase.


	4. D

## The Army Field Guide to Dignity: (100 words.)

 _"Polly!"_

She was _giggling!_ Again!

Generally Mal had no complaints. The girl was inventive and exceedingly good with her hands – but there _was_ this unfortunate tendency toward levity.

A rumpled head emerged, laughter filled eyes lifting to hers.

"You squeaked" Polly faltered apologetically.

"I did _not!_ "

Mal raised herself onto her elbows, needing to emphasise her point.

"I do not _squeak_. Such a thing would be _undignified_."

Polly's raised eyebrow encompassed the awkward position they had been forced to adopt, assessing it for dignity promoting potential and grudgingly Mal found herself forced to agree.

"We're gonna need a bigger tent."


	5. E

## The Army Field Guide to Etiquette: (100 words.)

 _"...with a snail if you slow to a crawl, but the hedgehog can never be..."_

"POLLY!" Mal stumbled into the singer, whether by accident or design it was hard to tell.

"Yes Sergeant?" Polly hiccupped delicately. "How may I be of ass-ass-ssistance this fine evening?"

"I don' think you should be s-singing that here Liff-tn, Leff-ten…boss. We're mm-mm-amm-mmbas-ass-adors 'member.

 _"mm-mm-amm-mmbas-ass-adors?"_ Polly waved an unsteady finger. "You're drunk, shargent. Turrible behaviour in front of a shuperioriorior offisher." She hiccuped rebelliously. "Iss good song."

Luckily for Borogravia, Mal staggered into her again at that point, silencing her in a well practised fashion.


	6. F

## The Army Field Guide to Formal Procedure: (100 words.)

"It's in Regulations, **_Officers: Caps: Procedures For The Wearing Of:_** You're a Lieutenant now; you've got to remember these things."

"Hang on..." Mal slid away, reaching over the side of the bed to feel about on the floor. Apparently what she was looking for was not there and she squirmed further over the edge. Being a vampire she did not fall ungracefully out of bed as Polly was wont to do under similar circumstances.

...

"Better?" Mal re-appeared with said cap adjusted to a jaunty angle.

"Most fetching," Polly drew her into an admiring embrace. _"You **do** know that's my hat..."_


	7. G

## The Army Field Guide to Gin: (100 words.)

"I can't not look!"

The disaster that was Colonel Fortescue happily imitating a go-go dancer on the high table whilst the top brass alternatively cheered and choked into their drinks was a sight that would stay with Polly for ever.

"He's quite flexible isn't he?" Mal sipped calmly from her wine glass and nodded in assessment, for all the world an Opera fan commenting on the latest young soprano. "Good legs."

 _"Good legs?"_ Polly searched wildly for her _sang froid_. "What do we say to him tomorrow?"

"Nicely done sir, here's an aspirin?"

It was tempting. _Very_ tempting.

Polly grinned.


	8. H

## The Army Field Guide to Hope and Its Maintenance Under Difficult Conditions: (100 words.)

"Tell me about the cottage."

"Again?" Mal allowed Polly to slide beneath an encircling arm. "Ok. There'll be a small tumbledown thatched place with roses climbing over the front porch." The dream grew in her mind. "It'll have leaded windows and an untidy garden round the back that I'll work every day making it beautiful for you to sit in like a lady. Every evening we'll wander through the garden so you can compliment me on my labour..."

"You'll garden?"

Mal nudged her, frowning. They were crouching in a muddy trench, what was a little fantasy gardening between friends?


	9. I

## The Army Field Guide to Inebriation: (100 words.)

"One more." Polly waved vaguely toward where she thought the barman was standing with his friendly bottle of rotgut.

"I think you've had enough, Lieutenant."

"I can still see Harper's insides dangling from the bright spring leaves of that bush." She said it perfectly calmly. "I'll have one more shot Sergeant and maybe one more after that and you'll not stop me."

She drank the drink.

Later as Mal held her hair back as she knelt over the gutter the vampire didn't say "I told you so" but merely carried her home and put her to bed.

War was hell.


	10. J

## The Army Field Guide to Justice: (100 words.)

"Coffee, Sergeant?"

"I don't deserve you."

The steaming cup sits beside her where Polly has just deposited it. The scent of coffee, that beautiful aroma that does such strange things to her insides, drifts up carried in tendrils of water vapour.

"You are an idiot. A daft coffee addicted idiot and I don't know why I even like you at all." But there's laughter behind the words and Polly freely adds a squeeze of strong arms and a kiss before vanishing and leaving her to the dratted reports.

 _No really. I don't deserve you. I never deserved you._

 _Thank you._


	11. K

## The Army Field Guide to Knots: (100 words.)

"Now pull it tight." Nervous fingers scrabbled at the binding.

"Tighter."

"Did you ever think you'd do this?" Polly murmured low into her ear.

Mal looked round.

 _Beside her Polly waiting patiently with the reel of string._

 _Behind her Paul, holding back Daisy, Shufti at his side cradling the burbling Alice in her arms._

 _Jack, tying the last knot before jumping to his feet to race away from them with the kite in his arms, sure that this time, **this time** it would fly._

It hadn't been where she'd originally planned to use that specific knot. But it would do.


	12. L

## The Army Field Guide to Location, Location, Location: (100 words.)

"We should try this in a bed sometime."

"Nothing would please me more." Mal glanced around at their delightful woody surroundings. "But any time I get you within spitting distance of a flat comfy surface you're out like a light and snoring within 20 seconds.

"I don't snore!"

Mal refused to rise to the bait. "Do you want me to stop?"

With the bark rough against her back, her thin shirt no protection against the sharp projections Polly assessed the options available to her and came to a quick decision.

"Best carry on Sergeant. I believe beds are over rated."


	13. M

## The Army Field Guide to Medals and Medal Ceremonies: (100 words.)

 _"...Captain Perks!"_

Polly stumbled out to face the crowd squashed into the ornate room, hurriedly tucking her shirt-tail into her breeches.

She hadn't wanted to come, had thought the idea of medals at a time like this was stupid. She had definitely grumbled loud and long over the scratchiness of her new dress tunic. That was until Mal had enforced an ingenious method of distraction on her after finding Polly hiding backstage.

 _"...For performance under difficult conditions!"_

Ramrod straight as Clogson pinned the medal on, Polly resolved to hand the trinket over to her Lieutenant at the first available opportunity.


	14. N

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I couldn't get this one down to 100 words no matter how I tried. So it's a ficlet for N, rather than a drabble.

## The Army Field Guide to Necessities: (107 words)

 _"I'm not standing for this!"_

The voice drifted up to where the two figures lay entwined on a lumpy mattress squashed into the only corner of the room unaffected by drips from the leaking roof.

 _"A billet? This is a crime against the meaning of the word! And the lavatorial facilities!"_ The complaining tone died away in horror.

Mal stirred, reaching out for Polly in her sleep.

"Shh, I'm here, I've got you."

Soothed by that familiar murmuring the vampire fell back into exhausted slumber.

"We got back, we made it. It's over."

 _"What kind of people would countenance sleeping here? It's lunacy!"_

Polly closed her eyes.


	15. O

## The Army Field Guide to Opportunities: Taking of. (Includes: Making Full Use Of Them When Presented): (100 words.)

"We should get up."

The response to Ms Perks' statement, which had been mumbled distractedly into her companion's smooth skin, could only be described as a whimper. She tried again.

"There's a whole town out there - sightseeing opportunities, cafés..."

"Cafés?" Mal's breath hitched on the word. _Surely there was something important about cafés, something she'd wanted to do this weekend, if only she could think._

Polly, currently interested in other decidedly more accessible opportunities, found an interesting spot and Mal gave up all rational thought for the foreseeable future.

 _Damn Cafés._ They got little enough leave as it was.


	16. P

## The Army Field Guide to Pervasive Odours: (100 words.)

Polly sat bolt upright. There was something there, something uncertain, teasing at the edge of her senses. Drawn by something unseen, she swung her legs over the side of the bed.

 _A figure wanders the dark corridors wrapped in a shabby blanket, following the smallest trace of scent. She feels her way onward toward her goal, the thread tugging her forward winding up around the spindle of her heart. Entering the kitchen, she slips grateful arms around the longed for personage brewing up over the stove, inhaling the scent of coffee, cigarettes and Mal, **pure Mal**._

"You got back."


	17. Q

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For an explanation of the Twinging Screws, see The Navy Lark (1959 to 1977)

## The Army Field Guide to Quarantine: (100 words.)

"I'm sorry Sir but you can't go in." A corporal stood before the door, arms folded in definite denial.

The Major, unused to being refused entry to a lowly lieutenant's quarters enquired as to the cause of such a ruling.

"It's the _Twinging Screws_ , Sir. Very nasty, Sir. Very contagious. Turrible boils for three days, Sir.

"Boils?" On the other side of the door a blond head shifted lazily from its comfortably pillowed position, attempting to send a probing look at the other occupant of the bed.

"Verisimilitude Polly. Serves the blighters right for not giving us the weekend off.


	18. R

## The Army Field Guide to R & R: (100 words.)

## 

 _"Thought vampires were allergic to sunlight..."_

Mal stretched in the sun like a well fed cat, tipping the large incongruous farmer hat further over her eyes. Sprawled atop the cargo her pose reeked of relaxation. Two weeks they'd been "escorting" this wagon train. Two weeks of sauntering lazily through the Borogravian countryside, undisturbed by the raiders intelligence had indicated might be stealing the Army's wheat supply. After the winter they'd had it was joy itself to lie in the sun as quiet day followed quiet day, occasional poking the oxen to stop them falling asleep.

 _"We adapt Polly, we adapt."_


	19. S

## The Army Field Guide to Spelling: (100 words.)

"What does this say?" Mal was frowning oddly at the notebook.

" _'Exercise'_? _'Expensive'_ maybe?"

Polly squinted, trying to remember what she'd meant when she'd scrawled those words, obviously in some kind of a hurry judging by the spiderlike tracing across the page.

"It looks like _'Exquisite'_ but why would you be writing that?"

Polly blinked. Surely she'd torn that page out and hidden it somewhere safe? She reached for the notepad, hiding her apprehension behind mild curiosity, but Mal snatched it away holding it out of reach.

" _'half hidden, like a...'_? Polly, is there something you want to tell me?"

~X~

[Thanks to Keats for his "Eve of St Agnes"]


	20. T

## The Army Field Guide to Tracking: (100 words.)

 _"Gotcha."_

"What's that?" Polly walked in to find Mal sat up clasping her knees, the sheet high enough to be decorous, but non-the-less low enough to suggest.

"I tracked you down and now I've caught you."

"Exactly how does making yourself comfortable in my quarters count as tracking me down?"

"Polly, everyone _knows_ the best trackers sense where their prey is headed and instead of wasting energy chasing them up hill and down dale, merely lie in wait."

"And why do you, _Oh Tracker Of Great Genius_ , think this prey is headed in your direction?"

Mal adjusted the sheet.

 _"Oh."_


	21. U

## The Army Field Guide to Under-Wiring: (100 words)

This was it. No chance of backing out now. She was actually going to do _it_ with a vampire.

 _If she didn't die of embarrassment first. Gods. Who called it it these days anyway?_

Polly caught her breath as that beautifully tailored shirt was lifted over a bowed head. The giggle was unfortunate, but in her defence she _had_ been taken by surprise.

"Corsetry, Mal?"

The vampire had the grace to blush.

"It holds things in. Used to chafe something chronic but Igorina helped improve the design." She shrugged. "I wasn't born _completely_ bereft of female accoutrements, Polly."


	22. V

## The Army Field Guide to Vows: (100 words)

"Mal?"

Polly could only manage a croak but it drew the attention of the figure quietly sitting at her bedside.

"Hey there, Pol. How're you feeling?"

"Ick." The word covered a multitude of symptoms. "You shouldn't be here, you don't wanna catch this."

A vampire _would_ be concerned about that; Dysentery was an undignified illness to come down with.

" _'In Sickness and In Health'_ , I believe the saying goes. I gave my word remember?"

She laid a cool hand on a frowning brow, brushing back damp hair.

"Now, go to sleep, Polly. I'll be here when you wake up."


	23. W

## The Army Field Guide to Water: (100 words.)

"Does it _ever_ stop raining?"

The grumble drifted up from the scattering of light infantry huddling along the ditch that was acting as a shallow trench. It was ignored, the officers at the end of the row too busy scanning a disintegrating map and squinting through the low hedge in a vain attempt to determine landmarks through the driving rain.

"They do say that spring in this part of the world can be delightful." Mal commented disinterestedly.

"Really?" Polly winced as a enterprising stream of water wrangled its way inside her collar. "When does it start?"

~X~

## The Army Field Guide to 'Weapon Of Choice': (100 words.)

It was after Bonk that Polly first learnt the power of those three simple words.

Mal was close, so close, Polly's hand driving her insistently onward with each calculated twitch. It had taken a while, an entertaining expanse of time that neither would ever consider wasted, but now they were here, hanging trembling on the brink. Polly ducked her head, murmured "I love you" into a delicate ear and felt Mal come apart in her hands.

After that it became the weapon of last resort, rarely used and only in times of the greatest need.

It worked every time.

~X~

## The Army Field Guide to Warmongering:

  
(not a true drabble I'm afraid, 150 words)

 _ **"EXCUSE me?"**_

 _As heckles go, it was definitely the most wrathful he'd ever experienced._

"Steady on Polly. There was that awful winter job, did that count as warmongering?"

"Don't think so, we stopped that one." She pondered. "There was that border incursion..."

"Stopped that."

 _There really were lots of green jackets in the audience._

"The grasshopper disagreement?"

"Prevented that. There was that time... no actually now I come to think of it, we stopped that one too."

"Odd that really." She spun back round to skewer him on an accusatory finger. "As for the current mess, they _definitely_ mongered against us."

"Piece of advice young man." Mal smiled with all her teeth. "The next time you decide to accuse the Green Devils of something, check your facts first."

"And pick a different pub." Polly sunk her nose into her tankard.


	24. X

## The Army Field Guide to Xylem and Phloem: (100 words)

"You make a little hole in the stalk, like so. Then gently push through the second stem, that's it."

 **_"Sergeant!"_ **

Mal came to abrupt sitting attention.

"Why are my new recruits sitting around making daisy chains?"

"Special training session, Lieutenant. Focussing on improving hand eye co-ordination."

"Really?"

"Truthfully, Lieutenant." Mal leant closer. "I did not feel it would uphold the chain of command to draw attention to the fact that the Lieutenant was called away to be indisposed. Again."

Polly scowled. "I should never have let you talk me into the fish."


	25. Y

## The Army Field Guide to You: (100 words)

No one grieves quite like a vampire. The species has a natural advantage, what with the pale visage, the clothes, the terrible poetry. It's almost as though they were designed with it in mind.

And they have all the time in the world to practice at getting good at it.

But as Mal suffered through those long empty nights when every hour stretched out to eternity and she sat alone in her window seat, huddled around the tearing ache that was all she had left of Polly, she couldn't help but wonder if grieving like a human wasn't immeasurably worse.


	26. Z

## The Army Field Guide to Zombies: (100 words)

 _"Polly?"_ A hissed whisper penetrated the darkness.

"Mrrm." Her companion, tangled in the arms of sleep, responded slowly to the urgent nudging but eventually managed a mostly comprehensible enquiry. "wassamarra?"

"There's a child in the bed. Male, about six years old, blond hair."

"Jack." Polly stretched lazily and then stopped as she connected with something solid and warm. "I seem to have Daisy." She adjusted the child carefully, wrapping her in a safe arm. "You shouldn't have told them those stories about zombies last night.

"Polly!"

"What?"

 _"I'm not dressed!"_


End file.
